The motivation to improve usage efficiency has long existed in the electrical power field. Growing energy demand, escalating energy costs and a heightened awareness of both energy security and climate change have long driven interest in the field to improved energy efficiency as mechanism for mitigating the impact of the power industry on sustainability and the environment. In view of this, the utility industry has been motivated to develop and implement comprehensive energy efficiency systems that allow them to monitor a power grid's component devices in real-time (visibility) and to remotely control/manage (i.e., alter or redirect the power going to) those devices in real-time. Further, the visibility and control must include a substantial degree of “granularity,” meaning that individual load components of the grid are visible to and controllable by the power management system. However, the electrical power distribution grids of electrical utility providers are not the only points at which meaningful electrical energy efficiencies need to be accomplished. It would be beneficial to the field if small electrical power consumers were similarly able to accomplish electrical usage efficiencies in the consumer's own premises power grid: the “micro-grid” represented by the consumer's premises (e.g., residence or place of business).
To accomplish a comprehensive, premises based energy efficiency program, it is necessary for the devices on premises power grid (the electrical wiring system on the drop-side of the utility provider's power metering device) to have real-time visibility and remote management capability for the small consumer analogous to the capacity the devices on a utility's distribution grid provide to the utility provider. In large industrial and commercial facilities, such visibility and control are often accomplish using very expensive proprietary hardware and software components not available to residential and small business consumers.
For premises, especially of residential and small business consumers, it would be beneficial if there were alternatives available in the way of off-the-shelf components and systems useful for accomplishing improved energy usage efficiencies, which components and systems do not require an inordinate amount of skill to install. The components of such a system as much as possible should resemble in structure and function, the existing components in the consumer's premises power grid. In other words, the new devices should be adapted to be readily retrofit into a premise' existing electrical lines to replace existing electrical appliance wiring devices. Additionally, the components should not require skill to install that is beyond that of ordinary electrician installer, and once installed should be unobtrusive in the environment of the premises. Further, the overall system and the remote system controller should be easy to understand, to implement and to operate—i.e., user friendly for the consumer.
Recently, products have been developed which attempt to address at least in part some of the aforementioned needs. Examples include: the “Kill-a-Watt” of P3 Industries (NY, N.Y.; www.p3international.com/products/special/P4400/P4400-CE.html), the “WattsUp” of Electronic Educational Devices (Denver, Colo.; www.wattsupmeters.com/secure/products.php), as well as the power plug and power strip device of U.S. Pat. No. 7,099,785. Although, these devices may be useful for their intended purpose, to visually monitor the electrical energy consumption of an individual appliance, these and similar devices do not enable the user to remotely (at a distance) monitor the device in a manner analogous to how a power company remotely monitors multiple devices. More importantly, these and similar devices do not enable the user to remotely control the device in a manner analogous to how a power company remotely controls devices on its power grid. Therefore, these types of device cannot accomplish the real-time visibility and remote management capability for the consumer, analogous to that which a utility has over the devices on its distribution grid.
Other products developed in the field for residential-type premises are useful for monitoring the “overall” energy usage of a premises or the “overall” energy usage of a single circuit breaker. However, these devices do not enable granular visibility and control of all or a substantial portion of individual loads on a premise' grid—it is not the individual load component or appliance that is monitored, only the usage of the line. The individual load components on the line are not visible. Therefore, these devices and the systems using them cannot provide the degree of granular visibility to residential user necessary to accomplish energy usage efficiencies analogous to that which a utility has over its distribution grid. Examples of this limited type of device are set forth in U.S. Pat. No. 7,043,380 to Rodenberg et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 7,263,450 to Hunter.
Rodenberg discloses a distribution panel circuit breaker monitoring device wherein the overall power usage of the drop-side of the breaker is monitored, but which cannot monitor the usage of the individual appliances on the drop. Therefore, the Rodenberg device fails to provide the granular visibility analogous to a utility provider's efficiency system. Hunter discloses an optical automatic meter reader, a data collector and a computer. The meter reader attaches outside of an existing utility meter and senses power usage, and the data collector stores power usage data obtained via the meter communicates the data to the computer for viewing by the user. The computer provides a centralized object through which the user views power consumption. The Hunter device and system only monitors overall power usage of the drop-side of the utility service meter. It cannot monitor the usage of the individual appliances on the drop. Therefore, the Hunter device also fails to provide the granular visibility analogous to a utility provider's efficiency system.
However, it would be beneficial if a system were available to a consumer micro-grid that provided visibility and control of energy usage across the micro-grid, without needing to utilize bespoke form-factors and configurations that do not accommodate simple retrofit, and that do not require custom wiring and installation. It would be further useful to have available such devices as would allow the consumer's micro-grid to interface with a local (“on the micro-grid”) power source, such as a battery bank or photo-voltaic array.